Cisco Net Academy & SCTE Announce Partnership

The Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) and Cisco Systems have announced that SCTE has become part of the Cisco Networking Academy Program. As a result, SCTE now is authorized to include certain Cisco networking curriculum in its professional development offerings.

This will help the Cisco Networking Academy meet its goal of providing opportunities to learn more about networking and IT, said Carroll McGillin, the academy’s national initiatives manager.

“If you look back at what the mission of the academy program really is, it’s to increase access in the knowledge economy for individuals to really (develop) network-centric skills. I think as SCTE is finding their mission in the cable market changing — they really saw the need to upscale the IP and networking skills of their members.

“What they really liked about the academy program is the strong emphasis on hands-on skills, as well as learning the knowledge. I think that combination really fit very well within their mission and what they bring to their members. We started this conversation almost a year ago, and then they began to develop the implementation, got their trainers up and running and just completed their first full class about a month ago.”

McGillin said the partnership already got some positive responses.

“I think the best feedback they got was that their members started saying, ‘When are you going to offer more courses?’ I think what’s unique about the partnership and the way they’re implementing it is that they’re obviously bringing to the table for their members is the context of how the network works in the cable industry.”

In addition to member education, representatives from SCTE and the Cisco Networking Academy have discussed the possibility of working together on initiatives to promote larger numbers of women in the IT workforce.

“When I visited their facility right outside of Philadelphia, one of the things they were very interested in was the commitment of the Cisco Academy program in the area of helping ensure that women continue to think about careers in IT,” McGillin said. “It’s certainly of interest to them, as they look at their future workforce and how they’re going to build that up.”